The clean-shaven man of legal aspect who arrives at his office over the way as regularly as the clock strikes ten, who leaves it as regularly at one for his lunch, and as regularly in the late afternoon closes up for the day, is the Novelist whose novels are on every bookstall and whose greatness is measured by the thousands and hundreds of thousands into which they run. He does not do us the honour of living in the Quarter, but comes to it simply in office hours, and is as scrupulously punctual as if his business were with briefs rather than with dainty trifles lighter than the lightest froth. No clerk could be more exact in his habits. Anthony Trollope was not more methodical. This admirable precision might cost him the illusions of his admirers, but to me it is invaluable. For when the wind is in the wrong direction and I cannot hear Big Ben, or the fog falls and I cannot see St. Martin's spire, I have only to watch for him to know the hour, and in a household where no two clocks or watches agree as to time, the convenience is not to be exaggerated. My neighbour from the house on the river-front, next to Peter the Great's, who often drops in for a talk and whom Augustine announces as _le Monsieur du Quartier_, is the American Dramatist, author of the play that was the most popular of the season last year in New York. I should explain, perhaps, that Augustine has her own names for my friends, and that usually her announcements require interpretation. For instance, few people would recognize my distinguished countryman, the Painter, in _le Monsieur de la Dame qui ne monte jamais les escaliers_, or the delightful Lady Novelist in _la Demoiselle aux chats_, or--it is wiser not to say whom in _le Monsieur qui se gobe_. But I have come to understand even her fine shades, and when she announces _les Gens du Quartier_, then I know it is not the American Dramatist, but the British Publicist and his wife who live in Garrick's house, and who add to their distinction by dining in the room where Garrick died.